Pedal to empower

Red Hatters “clip in” to share sustainable, life-changing transportation worldwide

Throughout July, the Tour de France transfixed fans as they tried to catch glimpses of the leading yellow jersey in the blur of racers. The color to watch this past June, however, was red. 

In a show of efficiency, over ten days, Red Hatters celebrated World Environment Day and World Bicycle Day by mounting their bikes and logging kilometers to give the gift of sustainable, life-changing mobility to women and children in developing regions of the world.

For every 1,000 kilometers (621.37 miles) cycled or for every ten Red Hatters who shared photos of their ride, Red Hat pledged one bicycle to World Bicycle Relief’s Pedal to Empower project, which aspires to give 1 million bicycles to women and children around the globe by 2025.

Seeing double  

220 Red Hatters “clipped in” to bicycle a total of 33,800km—about 10 Tour de Frances. 

On ridership and photos alone, Red Hat pledged 37 bikes. But, our efforts were part of a greater milestone. World Bicycle Relief announced that over three days 305,000 participants cycled 16,000,000km for the cause. 

To continue the momentum, and acknowledge that Red Hatters on average logged more kilometers than participants at large, Red Hat doubled its donation. In total, 74 bikes will be delivered to women and children in need of reliable, self-propelled transportation. 

What is World Bicycle Relief and Pedal to Empower? 

World Bicycle Relief partners with communities to deliver bikes engineered specifically for rural riders navigating rugged terrain, and train the locals how to maintain and fix them. It's developed an efficient, innovative and scalable model to empower students, health workers and entrepreneurs to travel where and when they need to. 

What an achievement! Besides saving emissions, we collected memories, some riders broke personal records or just exchanged their normal daily commute by taking a nice short bicycle ride to work.

This event also did a lot for our mental and physical well-being. And let’s face it, we just had loads of fun! We’re looking forward to Pedal to Empower in 2023.